


A Shield for the Righteous

by ETraytin



Category: Agent Carter (TV), Angel: the Series, Buffy the Vampire Slayer (TV)
Genre: Because I wrote it in 2015 - Freeform, Canon-Typical Violence, Season One Agent Carter only, Shared Universe
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-16
Updated: 2019-12-16
Packaged: 2021-02-26 03:21:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,704
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21816583
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ETraytin/pseuds/ETraytin
Summary: The Powers that Be have sent a champion to watch over a woman with the potential to change the world. Peggy Carter, though, does not need much defending.
Kudos: 9





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hi everybody! This is one of my very early fics that I'm just getting around to putting on AO3. I wrote it for a challenge at Twisting The Hellmouth, a Buffy crossover fic site, in 2015. Agent Carter only had one season on the air at that point, so of course that's how this fic is written. I was going to make it a longer work, I have a bit more floating around somewhere, but I think the two chapters here stand pretty well on their own. And this way I have all my fic archived together on AO3, at last!

It was long past dark by the time Peggy Carter walked out of the New York Bell telephone company building with her blue overcoat belted tight and her smart red hat tilted downward against the chilly November wind. Since Agent Dooley's death in the spring, Agent Thompson had been running the office of the SSR, with Peggy his unofficial second-in-command. A year ago she'd have been infuriated at the “unofficial” nature of the job, but by now she'd resigned herself to it. Or perhaps she was just too worn out from the constant workload to fight the benevolently condescending attitudes of her coworkers.

Oh, they knew what she was capable of now, and at times they even appreciated it, which was worlds better than conditions the previous year. The work was challenging, and when she spoke in a crisis, people listened. But any time that wasn't a crisis, she could still see her fellow agents biting their tongues to avoid giving her their lunch orders. She'd gone out for dinner once with Daniel Souza, shortly after Howard's name had been cleared, but the reaction in the office had quickly put paid to any thought of a relationship. She had enough people in her life asking her when she was planning on settling down and making babies without her coworkers chiming in! She and Daniel remained friendly, but he'd begun dating one of the telephone operators and seemed quite happy about it. Peggy wished him all the best and found she wasn't particularly disappointed.

The work kept her too busy for socializing anyway, which was fine with her. If it weren't for sharing a home with Angie and spending an occasional teatime with Mr. Jarvis, Peggy wondered if she'd ever speak with anyone who didn't have a double-breasted suit and a holster beneath it. Today had been particularly grueling, with much of the agency tied up in a manhunt for a lunatic in a mask claiming it was his duty to purge the sins of the city. They'd caught up with him late in the afternoon, but the paperwork had taken till nearly eleven pm. Now there was snow in the air and not a single taxi seemed to be operating in this neighborhood. She sighed and straightened her shoulders, resigning herself to a potentially lengthy walk.

There was an art to walking unmolested in the city at any time of day or night. Head up, shoulders back, no matter how much nicer it would be to huddle against the wind, keeping a constant eye out for danger, and holding one's possessions close. Peggy's heels clicked briskly along the sidewalk as she started down the street, the very picture of a woman not to be trifled with. If there were any muggers lurking so close to the SSR's secret headquarters, they were apparently quite cowed. Unfortunately, by the time she'd walked six blocks, there were still no taxis in sight and her feet, already worn from the foot chase earlier, were threatening armed resistance if she pushed them much further in heeled shoes.

Peggy was seriously considering the possibility of calling Angie and asking her to commandeer one of Howard's cars from the garage to collect her when a noise from behind her caught her attention. It was a subtle sound, almost lost in the wind, a shoe sliding over pavement. It was the kind of noise someone might make if they didn't want to be heard approaching. Trusting her instincts, she reached one hand into her purse and turned around, just in time to avoid being grabbed from behind!

Acting on well-honed instinct, Peggy led with an elbow jab to the chin, pushing her attacker back just enough for her to dodge his hands and jump backward a few steps. She closed her fingers around the gun in her purse and started to draw it, then got a look at her attacker's face. It was no human face, malformed and lumpy, yellow eyes that seemed to glow and fangs that dripped hungry saliva. Her heartbeat thudded in double-time as she let go of the gun and asked “What do you think you're doing?”

The unexpected question seemed to give the creature pause, but only for a moment before he grinned again. “Jusst sstepping out for a bite of dinner,” he told her, voice sibilant from the dripping fangs.

“What... what are you going to do with me?” Peggy widened her eyes fearfully, drawing her purse to her chest with one hand still inside it. “Please don't hurt me.”

The beastly creature cackled. “Thiss won't hurt a bit... after I kill you.” There was a clattering noise off to one side but Peggy ignored it in favor of the immediate threat. The creature lunged then, his eyes and attention locked on the triangle of throat exposed by the collar of her overcoat. He never even noticed the wooden stake she'd drawn from her purse and held up in front of her, not until he'd already impaled himself on it. He made a surprised “ulp!” noise before exploding into a cloud of ashy dust.

Peggy held her breath for a moment till the cloud dissipated, then immediately turned to see what had caused the clatter. She tensed when she saw another man watching her, this one tall and human-faced, rather handsome in a dissipated sort of way. He wore a business suit with no overcoat, a new and sharply creased fedora his only concession to the weather. From the way he was leaning against a stack of crates and grinning at her, he'd seen the show and not been surprised by its denouement. That meant he was most likely dangerous. “Find something amusing?” she asked archly, the stake still clutched in her hand.

“Just wasn't expecting to be an observer to the fight,” he replied in a tenor that was probably pleasant when it didn't sound scratchy from disuse. “You weren't surprised at all by that vampire.”

“Of course not,” she replied, slightly affronted. “He was barely a fledgeling, couldn't even speak around his own fangs.”

“Most fledglings find plenty of easy prey in a city like this,” the stranger pointed out. “People aren't aware, aren't prepared. How did you know about them?”

Peggy gave him a frosty little half-smile. “Someone once told me I had Potential,” she replied. “But my life went in a different direction. There are some things you never forget.” She put her hand and the stake back in her purse, ready to reach for it or her gun again if necessary. “Now if it's not too much trouble, perhaps you can tell me who you are and why you're following me?”

He straightened a little, revealing himself to be even taller than Peggy had realized. “Sorry, I got caught up in watching the fight and forgot my manners. You can call me Angel.”

“Angel,” Peggy repeated dubiously. “That's certainly a... unique name. And it doesn't at all answer the question of what you're doing lurking about in alleys so late in the evening.”

“Oh, I was watching you,” Angel replied, his slight smile indicating that he knew the answer would annoy her. He seemed to be enjoying it. “I was going to step in and take care of that fledge, but it turns out I didn't need to.”

Peggy tilted her head down and gave him a deeply unimpressed look. “So you believe yourself a guardian angel,” she surmised, her voice dry. “I can assure you there are plenty of people in this city more in need of your stalking protection.”

Angel shook his head, his smile growing a little wider. “That's probably true, you don't seem in need of much rescuing. But I've been given a mission, and you're it.”  
In an instant, Peggy's gun was in her hand, her face hardening. “Your mission? Who are you working for? Leviathan? HYDRA?” She took a step back, her heels crunching on vampire dust as she checked for threats from other directions.

“No, nothing like that,” Angel hastily reassured her, raising his hands. “I'm not with anybody, at least not in the way you'd understand it. The Powers That Be sent me to you, to help you with your work.”

“President Truman?” Peggy guessed, her brow furrowing in confusion. She didn't let it affect her stance, though, keeping her sights squarely on Angel. “What would he-”

“No, no!” Angel removed his hat and ran a hand over his severely oiled hair, disordering it. “I'm not doing this well. I'm not- not accustomed to dealing with people anymore.” He huffed out a breath. “You said you were a Potential, so you know that the world is older than anyone understands. Even before the start of that world, the Powers That Be already existed.”

“Are you speaking of God?” Peggy asked.

“Yes. No. It's hard to explain. They don't like to give a lot of explanations even to people who work for them,” Angel told her. “They're very powerful, but they don't intervene in the world directly. Something about your work, whatever it is you're doing in that telephone company, is important enough to have drawn their attention. You've got something they want you to accomplish, and they've sent me to help you do it. What that probably means is something very bad is about to start happening, and you're the one in a position to stop it before it destroys the world.

Peggy's gun drooped a little in spite of her efforts as she stared at Angel. “Are you addled?” she demanded.

“Look, is there somewhere we can sit down and discuss this?” he asked, sounding almost plaintive. “I know it's a lot to take in.”

“Fine,” she huffed. “I'll listen. But you'd better have a car.”


	2. Chapter 2

He did have a car, after a fashion anyway, a nearly-ancient Hudson Phaeton sport model with no top (it sticks, he explained) that even in the sickly light of the streetlamps she could tell was a shocking shade of red. It was still better than walking, but only just. Peggy comforted herself by noting that if he tried anything, it would be considerably easier to escape or evict him from the car than if she'd had to open a door.

“Where to?” Angel asked, sliding behind the wheel. Now that she'd agreed to hear him out, he seemed almost cheerful, and certainly far too energetic for the hour. All Peggy really wanted to do was to crawl into her bed with a good novel and fall asleep before reading a word of it. She suspected that whatever Angel had to say, it was nothing that would be conducive to a good night's sleep.

She considered her few options. Any place open this late at night was no place she wanted to walk into without a solid plan of action and preferably trustworthy backup. She certainly couldn't take him back to the SSR, think of the talk that would cause. She'd left the supernatural behind before the war, she wasn't at all eager to bring it back into her life now. “We'll go to my home,” she finally decided. Howard had any number of interesting little defense mechanisms built into his homes, if this Angel tried anything, he'd quickly be sorry for it. And hopefully Angie would already be in bed and none the wiser.

“That's a swank address,” he commented mildly, still in that amused voice. “I guess saving the world pays pretty well.”

Peggy blew out her breath in annoyance. “Godly mandate or not, I believe that is none of your concern.”

Angel snorted softly. “Just making conversation.” They drove in silence for awhile, Peggy finally giving into the impulse to huddle down into her overcoat against the blowing wind. She noticed that Angel didn't seem bothered by the cold at all, despite not even wearing a coat. A feeling of renewed unease crept through her, but her purse was already on her lap and so far he hadn't done anything threatening. Perhaps it was magic, perhaps he'd grown up in a cold climate. Peggy had not survived this long by expecting the best of people.

As they drove further from the downtown, the houses grew steadily further apart and further back from the street, tightly-packed roadways giving way to broad boulevards lined with elaborate lyre-post lamps. “Turn here,” Peggy spoke up when they came to a particularly ostentatious set of marble pillars surrounding an open wrought-iron gate. Angel's eyebrow spoke volumes, but she ignored it.

The long driveway ended in a circle in front of the house, surrounding a large fountain where in the summertime a trio of well-endowed marble nymphs poured water from urns into the basin below. Peggy much preferred it in its current state, turned off and covered with a protective tarpaulin for the season. “Is there a garage I can pull into?” Angel asked.

There was, of course. Even Howard's smallest home had an attached garage with three cars and room for as many more. “I'm afraid not,” Peggy told him. “You'll have to pull up in the front.” Angel parked without further complaint and walked with her up the broad front steps, waiting politely as she used her key and opened the door. “You'll have to be quiet,” she told him as she walked in. “My roommate is surely asleep by now.”  
She took three long steps into the house before turning around to look at Angel, still waiting on the stoop and trying to look innocent about it. “Well, what are you waiting for?” she demanded. “An engraved invitation?”

“Um,” Angel began.

“You're a vampire too, aren't you,” she demanded, folding her arms across her chest and keeping safely out of arm's reach. “But you're no fledgling like that other one. You have enough control to create a strategy and execute it, at least. I'm afraid any plans you've made for dinner will have to wait for another time.” She glared at him. “What is this all about, then?”

Angel looked to the heavens as though hoping to get assistance from his Powers that Be. “I already told you what it's about, Miss Carter. It's about protecting the world! My being a vampire doesn't change any of that.”

“Except perhaps your likelihood to try and snack on my throat,” Peggy pointed out.

“I don't do that anymore!” he insisted, his voice growing steadily louder. “I'm on a quest for redemption, a chance to redeem my immortal soul. If you only understood the kind of guilt-”

“You do not have a soul,” she interrupted. “I learned that much about your kind when I was still in pinafores.”

“Vampires don't. I do.” Angel folded his arms as well, mirroring her stance. It annoyed Peggy a bit that he could make it look so much more intimidating, just from his sheer size. “It's a long story, but I was cursed with a soul more than fifty years ago. Do you understand what it's like for a vampire to suddenly feel guilt? It's a crushing weight that is never lifted, never goes away. I stopped feeding from humans, but nothing I do can bring back all the people I killed, or undo the evil I did. All I can do is spend the rest of my existence working for good, and hope that in some small way I can balance the scales.” Despite his tough posture, Angel's eyes were sad and hopeful, like a small dog, perhaps a basset hound, begging for a treat.

She cleared her throat. “Yes, well, be that as it may, I don't-”

Peggy was interrupted by a voice from down the hallway. “Hey English, what's going on? I was startin' to get worried about you. It's past midnight, and I was about ready to call the cops!” Angie shuffled into the room in her mint-green bathrobe with her hair tied in rag curlers and slippers on her feet. “Did you catch that-” She stopped short when she realized that Peggy wasn't alone. “Whoa, hello there, fella!” Angie hastily did up her bathrobe a little more snugly “I didn't realize you brought home a friend.”

“Oh he's not-” Peggy began, but Angie was on a roll.

“What are you doing leaving him out on the porch for? It's freezing out there. Get in here and I'll make some coffee,” Angie told Angel, completely overriding Peggy's quick objection. “You should see the setup in this kitchen, I could run a cafe out of it no problem except the customers would track up the pretty floors. I'm Angie.”  
“Angel,” Angel replied with a slight smile, walking into the house with his arms deliberately loose at his sides, nonthreatening. “It's a pleasure to meet you.”

“Angel, huh? That's a weird name,” Angie opined.

Angel grinned at her, moving to follow her to the kitchen. “Sorry, it's the only one I've got.”

Peggy took a protective step forward, putting herself between her friend and the vampire. “Angie, I'm afraid Mr. Angel and I have business to discuss, of a sort that is quite confidential. You should get back to your bed, don't you have an audition tomorrow morning?”

“You're sending me to bed?” Angie frowned, a look dangerously close to a pout covering her face. Peggy nearly weakened, might have given in if not for the fact that she was trying to protect Angie from the dangerous vampire she'd inadvertently let into the house. “I'm not five, you know.”

“Yes, I'm afraid so,” Peggy replied apologetically, even as she waved Angel towards the study. “I'd be sending myself there if I could, but this cannot wait. I'll meet you for lunch tomorrow at the automat and we can talk about your audition.”

“Your life is way too full of secret business, English,” Angie sulked, but turned around and headed for the relative safety of her bedroom. Peggy breathed a sigh of relief, then followed Angel into the study and shut the door.

“Nice place you've got here,” Angel commented, looking around at the plush leather furniture and mahogany-paneled walls. He ran a hand over the green baize of the pool table in the corner, keeping, she noted, one slightly wary eye on the rack of cues. “Seems a little masculine for your tastes.”

“That's enough,” Peggy cut him off. “You may have inveigled an invitation to my home, but that does not make you welcome here. If you have anything that is actually useful or helpful to say, you have approximately thirty seconds before I begin quoting Scripture and waving a cross at you.” Exactly where she'd find a cross in Howard's little den of engineering and iniquity was an open question, but she could make do.

He gave her a lazy smile. “Even the devil himself can quote Scripture, Miss Carter.”

“Agent,” she snapped.

“Agent Carter,” he corrected himself. “Look, I know we've gotten off on the wrong foot, but I can be an asset to you.” He spread his hands. “You need some muscle? I've got muscle. You need a driver? I have a car. You need someone who won't stand out to investigate a dive or a club? I'm your guy.”

“Yes, I'm sure a ten-foot tall Irishman with a carburetor’s worth of oil on his head is entirely unremarkable anywhere he goes,” she commented dryly. “And none of that addresses the fact that you are an inhuman creature of the night and I have absolutely no reason to trust you.”

He thought about that for a moment, then nodded slightly. “Painful, all of that, but I'd like to point out that I'm barely six feet tall. I just associate with short people. And I have a soul.”

“I'm afraid I'm not endowed with the mystical ability to see souls,” she replied. “Perhaps that's one of the talents I missed out on when I never became the Slayer.”

“Even a child is known by his doings, Agent Carter,” Angel pointed out. “Don't measure me by the yardstick of other vampires, look at what I'm doing now and you'll see I'm not the same creature I was.”

“Back to the Scripture then, Mr. Angel?” Peggy retorted. “Then allow me to retreat to literature. 'I intend to judge things for myself; to judge wrongly, I think, is more honorable than not to judge at all.' The only thing I've seen of your doings thus far is that you've been following me around and have refrained from eating me for nearly two whole hours.”

“I'd offer you references,” he told her, “but I'm afraid I don't socialize with many people you'd find any more believable than you find me. And the Powers don't seem to be interested in furnishing you with my credentials.”

“I'd call my own contacts,” she shot back, “but I suspect their advice would not weigh in the direction of trusting you with my back.”

Angel sighed. “You're right about that. But it's going to be hard to judge me if you never see me in action.” He bent down to the desk, wrote some information down on a piece of paper. “Here's my address and the phone number of the place where I'm staying. You can call me anytime you need anything, day or night.” He hesitated. “Nighttime is better.”

With some reluctance, Peggy took the slip of paper and tucked it in her purse. “I'll take it under consideration. I think it's time for you to go, Mr. Angel.”

Angel sighed, but didn't argue as they stepped out of the study. “I know this is all strange to you. It certainly wasn't how I thought I'd be spending the end of the decade, moving back to New York and helping a federal agent. And an ex-Potential, at that!” He shook his head, pausing at the front door. “But if the Powers take an interest in something, it's because it's important. If they want me with you, it's because us working together is necessary. I know you're trying to save the world. Let me help”

He waited a beat, then when she said nothing, turned and walked out the door without further argument. Peggy watched him drive away, then shut the door just a bit harder than necessary.


End file.
